2 PROCEEDINGS OF THE NATIONAL, MUSEUM vol.81 



From 1865 to 1868 Lieut. William Healy Dall was engaged in 

 work in Alaska under the auspices of the Smithsonian Institution. 

 He made extensive zoological collections, including large numbers of 

 insects. Among the insects were numerous examples of Papilio 

 tnachaon^ which on their arrival in Washington were sent to Samuel 

 Hubbard Scudder at Cambridge, Mass. 



In 1863, J. William Weidemeyer in listing Papilio zolicaon gave 

 as the habitat " Labrador ; United States." It is probable that the 

 mention of Labrador was based upon the specimens collected by 

 Drexler and subsequently sent to Edwards, though there is no proof 

 of this. At that time Edwards had not described oregonia, and as 

 zelicaon Lucas { = zolicaon Boisduval) was the only yellow repre- 

 sentative of the Machaon group known from North America, any 

 3^ellow form in that group would have been referred to it. 



The first definite record of Papilio 7iiachaon in America was pub- 

 lished by Edwards, who wrote in 1868 that some years before he had 

 received several specimens that had been taken by Drexler at Rupert 

 House, Hudson Bay. 



Scudder, in 1869, described Papilio aliaska, which was based upon 

 16 specimens collected by Lieutenant Dall, most of them at Nulato 

 (or Nualto), May 20-24, but others on June 5, 6, and 14 at a short 

 distance below the Ramparts (on the Yukon River in central Alaska) 

 and also just above them. Scudder said that Edwards had sent him 

 a specimen from the east coast of Hudson Bay. This was one of the 

 specimens collected by Drexler. 



Scudder wrote that his new Papilio aliaska was of the same size 

 and facies as P. zolicaon. This makes it clear that his description 

 was based upon one or all of the specimens collected by Lieutenant 

 Dall, as the Alaskan form of P. machaon is very dark and is in 

 general much like P. zelicaon. 



In 1882, Edwards said that the specimens from Rupert House had 

 been collected in 1860 by C. Drexler when traveling under the aus- 

 pices of the Smithsonian Institution. They were picked off the 

 gooseberry bushes early in the morning while stiffened with cold. The 

 species was abundant there. He noted that Lieutenant Dall took his 

 examples at Nulato, and that Lucien M. Turner and E. W. Nelson 

 had found the species common at St. Michael. He remarked that 

 there was great uniformity between all the American specimens he 

 had — four from Hudson Bay and eight from Alaska. 



Having assembled a series of the various forms of Papilio 

 machaon., he had found that the American form is more melanic than 

 the Old World forms with the exception of that from the Himalayas, 

 iind he said that if Menetries had not limited his asiaticiis to the ex- 

 amples that have a straight edge to the inner side of the marginal 

 border of the hind wings his name probably should cover the Ameri- 



